Knowledge VS Belief

I've been studying comparative religions and as many different branches of science as I can understand for about 7 years (5-12 hours daily). I have learned the difference between belief and knowledge. The two are not interchangeable. If belief had knowledge it would not be able to be called belief, it would be knowledge. Believing is not good enough for me, I want to know. I Only then can I attempt to repair my mistake. I have learned that I am not comfortable relying upon belief to shape how I interact with all people or how I treat them. I feel stronger knowing that I have done another harm than if I only thought I did. Knowledge holds all the power to assist us in creating a more loving, fulfilling world society.

The main problem that I have with any type of belief is that it separates us into different groups, us and them. It is the same dichotomy prevalent in the much used divisions of male/female, black skin/white skin/all skin colors, smart/stupid, rich/poor, American/German/French/Italian and all others. Every one of these distinctions leads us to "us" and "them". Therein lies my problem.

I am not willing to give those divisions any reasonable reason for separating us from each other. We are equal beings on this planet, and any ideology that divides us into different groups, can lead us towards the habit of treating each other with less respect. I have seen it on both individual and grand scale. It is not mankind that is the problem, it is these ideas that keep us apart and also leads us to harm each other.

As long as we use beliefs as the motivation for the way we treat each other, we will erroneously treat each other as better or worse than "we" are. Each time we tell each other that our belief is the only right one we are actually belittling all others we encounter.

In the end, the only two choices we will end up with is that we will acquire the knowledge that one ideology or religion is the truth or we will realize that none are. At that point we will finally have grown up to the point of no war, no hate, NO PREJUDICE. We will finally treat each other with the love and support that we all need and deserve. It can only happen when we make other people's happiness and well being our main goal. We can only do it with knowledge, not ritual, dogma or a reliance on the past.